A thought about putting ebooks free on the internet. It seems counterintuitive to think that giving something away for free is going to benefit you. Isn't the whole capitalist system based around maximizing profit and squeezing every penny that the customer is willing to pay out of them. This, however, may be the best thing that a new, or sometimes established, author could do.
If you are Jim Collins (of Good to Great
fame), all you need to do is whisper that you are writing a new book and every newspaper, blog, journal, author, etc. will be making this anouncement for you the next day. However if you are Joe Callihan, from Puddlejump Nebraska, you aren't going to have that luxury. So rather than create a website that explains how good your book is, and hope that your friends and family buy enough books to cover the costs, you could give it away for free. This way at least when someone stumbles on your site (or your mom's book club finally gives in and checks it out) they can take a look through your book and see that you are really providing value. People don't have to take your word that you have great ideas, they can find out for themselves. Without any traditional marketing you have allowed the possibility for people to test drive your product and see whether it is worth their while. This at least has the possibility of taking off in the online community, a couple of people start blogging about it and all of a sudden it takes off. Sure you may lose a few sales because people decide just to read the online version, but at least you people have decided to read your book, something that likely would not have happened if they had to drive to the store and buy it or take a risk that it is good and buy it online. Besides, most people do not want to sit at their computer screen and read a 200+ page book. More than likely if they like a few pages of it they will spend the $15 and buy a hardcopy.
For a list of free e-books that I have found online check out the lense I made for it.
